Bananarama!

Jefferson and I spent a quiet Christmas at home this year and had a wonderful time. We even got into the British ways of having Christmas pudding and it was disgusting but I'm glad we did it.  It's like a gelatin mass of fruit cake that sometimes has liquor and you sometimes light on fire. Which we didn't (maybe next year).

Our adorable tree.

Xmas "pudding"

Then Banana came to town - my roommate for all four years at Kenyon. Her name is Anna, but I call her Banana, and we had suuuuch a great time.

First we celebrated New Years together along with the Wild's and other awesome folks. We played a hilarious ring toss game involving blow up reindeer antlers, which I didn't want to take off for the rest of the night.

We went to afternoon tea twice - each one was awesome. The first was Science tea (SCIENCE!). It was near the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum so the theme was fitting and hilarious. The desserts were all shaped like dinosaurs or planets or astronauts, and the scones were delicious. We also went to the always amazing Fortnum & Mason tea in the Diamond Jubilee room - my personal favorite. So tasty, so pretty - and bottomless scones, desserts and mini sandwiches. NOM. Wait, we did it three times if I count the super cute tea room in Edinburgh that we went to. You can never have too much tea! Or scones. Or cake.

Scottish Tea!

SCIENCE! tea

We went to so very many museums. Banana went to even more without me, but together I'm pretty sure we saw every museum Edinburgh has to offer on our short trip to Scotland. Banana is not one to pass up anything at museums that say, "try this on to see how people dressed way back when...". 

We also did a bunch of things I've always wanted to do here but never got around to - like the Sky Gardens on top of the walkie-talkie building here, going to the Greenwich Observatory and Planetarium, or having a pint at the Plume of Feathers pub near Greenwich park (it was everything I wanted it to be - cozy, cute, good beers and chips). SO FUN.

We Moved! Then went to Sweden! Then the states!

We moved one whole building over. So same complex, but different apartment layout. It's awesome! If you need the address, just email us.  Big/good differences: our deck is now three times larger (awesome), our kitchen is open to the main living room (also awesome), and instead of a diagonal hallway and weirdly shaped rooms, everything is now nice and square and the use of the space is fantastic (awesome-est). Our view of the Thames is also a bit cooler because we can see all of Canary Wharf and we can see the curve in the river.

Foggy Morning

Not so foggy

  

We also traveled to Sweden with the Wild's at the beginning of December to check out some Christmas markets! It was very fun but VERY cold. One might say bitterly cold.

The main Christmas market we ventured to was a bit hard to find and was smack in the middle of one of those old towns where they recreate scenes from the past like, "check out what Christmas would have been like for this family in the 1920's!". Not an exciting kind of town, but the market was cute.

    

Vasa Museum!

Best cookies! NOM

Smallest Gluhwein

Then in mid-December we went to the states to see everyone for the pre-holidays. Chicago first, where it felt just as bitterly cold as Sweden, but it was a great trip. We had all the mac and cheese (all of it) with my volleyball team, Rocko surprised us again (awesome), AND we finally got to go to Helen and Paul's Champagne party extravaganza - here's my favorite pic of that.

Then we finally warmed up in Arizona and got to hang with family before heading back to ol'London town.

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! 2016 was a stone cold beast and I'm looking forward to what will hopefully be a much nicer 2017. WAHOO!

Belated Halloween

 

 
Since we have two friends in London with birthdays on the 29th of October we decided to have our Halloween party the weekend after instead - which also happened to be the 5th of November (Guy Fawkes day). They celebrate that here in London by setting off lots of fireworks and burning effigies of Guy Fawkes. Totally normal.

The other thing we learned when throwing a Halloween party here is that you have to have a theme. Just saying, "Halloween" won't do. So our theme was ANIMAL. I went as a mounted trophy of a lion's head and Jefferson went as the hunter that shot me. It was a fun but mellow night and next year we need to get the pub crawl part of the night going again. Feast your eyes on these lovely animal pics...

Yummy spread!

Decor

Decorations

Lots of poses with the wall trophy...

 
And probably my favorite pic of the night - it looks like our friend Matt is saying something just amazing and poetic about this dip he's eating - and we're all listening very intently.

Granada, Spain

Last week I traveled to Granada, Spain with our friend Steve while Jefferson traveled to Denmark for work. It was a really fun trip and not just because - but mostly because - when you buy a drink they bring free food to your face ("tapas"). It's an amazing thing to experience. Every drink comes with a small to medium size food at no additional cost.


Some of the foods were really good - cheese, paella, pork, choroizo - and all were served with bread. These people like their carbs. The moment I got into town I met Steve at a Taberna and upon ordering a beer was given a plate of most delicious paella:

First free tapas, NOM

We also did a private tour of the Alhambra - which is a famous palace and fortress complex. We walked around it on our tour for about three hours and learned a lot. For instance, they don't know where the name "Alhambra" came from but they do know it means, "the red one" and the very first Muslim ruler to build up the Alhambra was, in fact, a ginger (red head) by the name of Mohammed. Amazing! So it could have been a reference to him - but much like Stonehenge, they have no idea. Here are just a few of the amazing things found in and around Alhambra - including a beautiful view of the Sierra Nevada mountains (see last pic way below).

 

 
















Steve and I walked all over Granada - to parts most tourists don't go, parts lots of tourists go to, pretty much just picking a direction and going that way for a while then deciding to turn when it suited us. Which is how we found donut shop named Moopies (yes, I ate a donut), a free set of workout equipment in a park, and the strangest shaped eggplant ever.

  

Sierra Nevada mountains behind us!

Meine Schwester Stacey

That means, "my sister" in German.

A few weeks ago Jefferson and I traveled to Berlin to visit our friend Rob. We were at the tail end of bad head colds so we didn't go too crazy but we had a great time. The first night in I got there earlier than Jefferson so Rob took me to an indoor street food market that was DELICIOUS. We had some craft beers, some pork belly bao, shared some raclette (cheese) and then had some ice cream to top it off. On our way to this market we passed a restaurant called, "Rocco and his brother" - see below - ha!

It's starting to become a trend for Jefferson and I to visit botanical garden's when we travel and the one in Berlin is supposed to be one of the top in the world! I don't know who decided that but it was pretty. We also went to visit the East Side Gallery which I liked a lot more than I expected. The "gallery" is a long portion of the Berlin Wall still intact and painted on the front side by artists and the back side by anyone who wants to graffiti it I guess. Here are the two pics of art/graffiti on the wall that I liked best.

From my Sup Gurl chronicles

Cute panda!

      

 After that my sister, Stacey, came to visit for a week and a half and we had a fantastic time! Super relaxed and super fun. I did make her walk a LOT but we saw some cool things and I even got her to play Pokemon Go for a hot second (she was thrilled, I tell you). Pokemon was second only to how much she loved me making her do a Snapchat photo each morning - mua ha ha - check these out:

We visited this Ramen restaurant that gives you hair ties and bibs - which are really quite helpful.

Duck Face!

Terrifying Bunnies

     

Poor Stacey now knows my neighborhood very well but that could be because she had to go to the Dentist with me THREE times while she was here. THREE. Imagine me putting one fist in the air and shaking it with an angry expression and yelling, "SMIIIITTTTTA!" That's what I do a lot now - and that is the name of my dentist. I got a temporary crown just before Stacey got to town and it fell out twice while she was here. Very exciting stuff. I'm on a more permanent but still temporary one and I've kept all my teeth in my mouth for one week as of today. WOO!  Gotta have goals.

It was an awesome trip and right after Stacey headed back to the states, I headed to Spain with our friend Steve and Jefferson went to Denmark for work, per usual. More on Spain in a bit...

Oktoberfest in Hagenbrunn!

   

Lederhosen nutella!

Oktoberfest dress!

Strutting their stuff

  

Backyard BBQ!

Last weekend was Oktoberfest and we spent it in Hagenbrunn (just outside of Vienna) with Rene and Frank. I love love love visiting them and it's not just because they home cook the most beautiful and tasty meals, or because you can walk three minutes down the to Schmidt (a traditional Heuriger where you can eat scumptious pork and drink delicious wines), and NOT because they have a pool and an outdoor BBQ area and .... wait, yes. It IS for all those reasons that I love to visit. Indeed.

Delicious piggies.

Jefferson borrowed some lederhosen and I bought a traditional dirndl so we were dressed in style and it was tons of fun.

There was a cover band and for some reason Rene and I decided that since the only American song they usually play is "Country Roads" then we absolutely must request it - for I am from America (nevermind that I am not from West Virginia - NEVER YOU MIND). So we danced our way to the stage and requested it and they made an announcement that I was from Chicago so everyone turned to me and clapped and then they played that song for me. Hilarious.

We escaped!

You know those escape rooms? Where you have to figure out puzzles and find clues in order to get out of the room? Well we were locked in one for my birthday (thanks to the Wilds!), and we had a zombie in ours. We were led into the room with no zombie in it and about a minute later she burst through one of the closet doors and made everyone squeal like ninnies. Every five minutes the zombie would be let out further on her chain so she could get closer to us. If the zombie touches you - you're out (dead/infected = have to stand against the wall in shame).

We all survived - and we escaped! Sarah Wild wins for best zombie distraction. Ruth, Jefferson and Cat win for taking the lead on figuring out clues. I win for it being my birthday. I was the one to open the door at the end, but only because someone shoved the key at me and screamed OPEN THE DOOR! And yes, at first I tried to open the wrong door - how was I to know? One funny part was that there were two people in there with us (strangers to us) that stayed in the corner furthest from the zombie the whole time because they were scared. They know it's fake, right? I'm not sure they did.

We had zero casualties and escaped in really good time (which I can't remember right now). Woot!

We also had some visitors recently - Fell and Art! We all went on the London Loo tour together - and yes, that is a tour all about toilets. We only went into one toilet together (and it was impressive), but we learned a TON about the history of toilets and plumbing in London. Did you know when they first made public toilets they only made them for men? Because women don't do that stuff. RUDE.

At the Jubil-loo

Underground Ur-RYE-nal that rises up at night!

We also learned that the first sewer system made in London (~1858) was made by taking over part of the Thames - and is still in use today. Which means it was a system built for a lot fewer people - and that is why when it rains too much those same sewers overflow and go straight into the Thames. I told you that water was gross and not to be touched.  I now know where you can go potty in a pinch all over downtown London and for that alone the tour was worth it.

Art cooling off Fell in the black cab

Riding around town.

We are currently in the happiest place on earth: Rene and Frank's outside of Vienna. We had both lunch and dinner at Schmidt yesterday (winery just down the road), went for a dip in the pool, walked around the tiny town and fields of grapes - and this weekend we'll go to Oktoberfest here - woohoo!